http://dx.doi.org/10.7592/FEJF2016.64.jumal
ESTONIAN JUMAL ‘GOD’
Anni Jürine, Karl Pajusalu, Renate Pajusalu, Ilona Tragel, Ann Veismann
Abstract: The article focuses on semantics and the use of the word jumal ‘god’
in Estonian. At first, we give an overview of the etymology of jumal ‘god’ and its
meanings in Standard Estonian and Estonian dialects. Then we examine jumal
‘god’ as a linguistic unit associated with different constructions and collocational
patterns, bleaching of the meaning, and usage in fulfilling different communication goals. In our study we show how jumal ‘god’ can refer literally to the higher
power of Christianity or some other religion but it is also used in the weakened,
bleached sense, meaning ‘very, completely’ or ‘total, absolute’, and in combination
with certain verbs, meaning ‘random’, ‘indefinite’.
Keywords: collocations, discourse analysis, Estonian, etymology, folk linguistics,
semantics
INTRODUCTION
This article is inspired by Urmas Sutrop’s long-time linguistic and ethnological
interest in the concept god (see for example Sutrop 2003, 2004a). We endeavor to
give a comprehensive overview of the etymology of the Estonian word jumal ‘god’
and its use in modern Estonian and Estonian dialects. We therefore examine
jumal ‘god’ not as a theological concept but as a linguistic unit associated with
different constructions and collocational patterns, bleaching of the meaning,
and usage in fulfilling different communication goals.
In modern Estonian, jumal ‘god’ can refer literally to the higher power of
Christianity or some other religion but it is also used in the weakened, bleached
sense ‘very, completely’ or ‘total, absolute’. A metaphoric meaning ‘object of
respect or desire’, for example, Kunst jäi tema jumalaks ‘Art remained his/her
god’ (EKSS 2009), can also be found. Since there is no grammatical gender in
Estonian it is not possible to determine based on the linguistic material whether
jumal ‘god’ is male or female.
To show all of the variation in the use of the word jumal ‘god’ we have gathered
data from different corpora of Estonian (etTenTen, University of Tartu Corpus
of Written Estonian, University of Tartu Corpus of Spoken Estonian, University
http://www.folklore.ee/folklore/vol64/jumal.pdf
Anni Jürine, Karl Pajusalu, Renate Pajusalu, Ilona Tragel, Ann Veismann
of Tartu Corpus of Estonian Dialects). First, we will present the etymology of
the word jumal ‘god’ and its distribution in the Finno-Ugric languages and
dialects of Estonian, then we will examine the verb collocations of jumal ‘god’,
i.e., answer the question what does god do? In the second part of the article we
will concentrate on the uses of the word jumal ‘god’ where it does not literally
mean a higher religious power but has aquired new functions in exclamatory
sentences as an intensifier of other nouns, and in the constructions jumala eest
and jumala pärast (both could be translated as ‘for God’s sake’).
ETYMOLOGY AND DIALECTS
The word jumal ‘god’ is known in all Finnic languages and the word jumo is
used actively in this sense in Mari languages (EES 2012: 100–101). In Permic, Ugric and Samoyed languages the word is not attested, showing that it
does not belong to the oldest layer of vocabulary of the Finno-Ugric languages.
Nevertheless, some sources have considered it a native word (SSA I 1992: 247).
More likely, it is an Indo-Iranian loanword. Jorma Koivulehto has proposed
an original stem *diyumna, cognate of Sanskrit dyumān- ‘heavenly, shining,
radiant’ (Koivulehto 1999: 228; see also Uibo 2014: 190–191). Recently, the
origin of the word jumal ‘god’ has been examined in detail by Ene Vainik (2014)
who also considers the (Proto)Indo-Iranian origin likely but deems the most
suitable original stem to be *jumV, meaning ‘twin’. In addition, referring to
Karulis (1992: 361), Vainik compares the word with Sanskrit derviation yamala
‘in pairs, doubly’ and Prakrit yamala- ‘twins’, but also Latvian jumala ‘abnormally fat female (also when expecting twins)’ (Vainik 2014: 21–26). However,
Vainik is not completely convinced whether the word was borrowed into the
Finnic languages in the form *jumala and additionally presents the options that
the word could originally have been a derivation with a locative suffix -l(a) or
a compound word with a locative meaning (*jum+ala ‘God’s place’) (ibid.: 25).
In all Finnic languages the word refers to a supernatural being, i.e., personified god, probably being borrowed as such already into the Proto-Finnic (or an
earlier form of it).
In the development of the different meanings and usage connections of the
word jumal ‘god’ the uniqueness of it as a mental category in the world-view
of the language has played an important role (Sutrop 2003). It is evident that
jumal ‘god’ has not been used in the Finnic languages as the name of a specific
god (c.f. for example Taarapita, Sutrop 2001a), rather, it has been used as
a generic term for a divine being, both in the abstract sense of a heavenly God
as well as the concrete sense of a statue of God (for the latter, see Sutrop 2004a).
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
The word jumal ‘god’ is attested in all dialects of Estonian (EMS II, 6:
174–178), occurring in the forms jumal ~ jummal ~ jummal´ ~ d´ummal´~
jomal ~ jommal ~ jõmmal´ etc. The several different dialectal developments of
the word’s phonetic form may be related to its expressive content, for example
the gemination of the stem consonant -m- and the palatalization of the final
consonant -l (jummal´ ~ jommal´~ jõmmal´). In Estonian dialects the word
refers to the Christian God, an omnipotent supernatural being, a pagan deity,
a faery, figuratively also nature, destiny, an omniscient person, also a statue
of god and an icon. In addition to being used as the main word of the phrase it
can be widely used in dialects as a modifier signifying something ordained by
God, natural, inevitable, independent of man’s actions, e.g., Kod suri jumala
surma, ega tädä es tapeta ‘died of natural causes, he/she was not killed, lit. died
God’s death’, Nõo üte jumala päevä kõik ‘God’s days all (i.e., all days are the
same)’, Rõu kiä tiid kas um tä jumala rist vai tulõ esi’ ‘who knows if this/he/
she is God’s cross (i.e., destined to be) or comes by itself (spontaneously)’. The
expression jumala ilm ‘God’s weather’ may refer to both good weather and
bad weather, storm, thunder: IisR ninda ilus pühäbäne jumala ilm ‘such nice
Sunday-like God’s weather’, Mus vali jumala ilm oli väljas ‘there was stormy
God’s weather outside’.
In dialects the word jumal ‘god’ also occurs in many fixed expressions and
exclamations, especially expressing startlement and regret: Mar armoline jumal
‘merciful God’, Lüg jumal paraku ‘God make better’, Kaa jummal´ oitka ‘God
keep’, Mar tule sa jumal appi ‘God help’, Lüg kie jumal sedä tiab ‘who the God
knows that’, etc. The expression jumala eest (lit. from the front of God) means
‘certainly, definitely, indeed’: Krk jumala iist sii om õigus ‘indeed this is true’;
in a negative sentence its meaning is ‘by no means, under no circumstances’:
Jäm jumala eest ma pole teind seda ‘by God, I have not done this’; the expression jumala pärast ‘for God’s sake’ occurs in confirmations, but often also in
warnings: Krk jumale pärast, ära sa mitti tetä usu ‘for God’s sake, do not belive
him/her’. In requests also the expression annaks ~ aitaks jumal ‘God give ~
help’ is used: Pee annaks jumal vihmukest, et saaks selja sirutist ‘(colloquial)
God give rain so we could straighten our backs’.
Metaphoric use of the word jumal ‘god’ with different verbs is diverse. In the
South Estonian dialects jumaladõ ~ jumalahe ~ jumalilõ minema ‘go into God’
refers to sunset: Har päiv nakas jumaladõ minemä ‘the sun started to set’;
jumalan ~ jumalah olõma ‘be in God’ means ‘to have set’: Har päiv om jumalan
‘the sun has set’. This metaphor is not known in other European languages,
however, it can be connected with the Estonian idiom päike läheb looja ‘the sun
is setting’ (the ambiguous word looja means ‘the Creator’, too, see EES 2012:
249). However, in European languages the idiom jumala karja ~ kohtu ette
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minema ‘go to God’s flock ~ to the front of God’s justice’ has a lot of equivalents.
Such phrases refer to dying in both North and South Estonia: Rei läks jumala
karja ‘went to God’s flock’, i.e., ‘died’, Krk sii om jumale karja ärä lännu joh
‘he/she has already gone to God’s flock’, i.e. ‘he/she has already died’; jumala
karjas ~ kohtu ees olema ‘be in God’s flock ~ in front of God’s justice’ is to be
dead: Lai see ammu jumala karjas ‘that one has been in God’s flock for a long
time’, i.e. ‘that one died a long time ago’.
A widespread greeting, especially to one working in the field, was jumal appi
‘God to help’ to which one always replied aita jumal ‘help, God’: Kod kui tuleb
väljäle tüü juure, ütleb: jumal appi; tõene ütleb: aita jumal ~ jumal tarvis ‘when
(a person) comes to the field where work is being done he says: jumal appi ‘God
to help’; the other replies aita jumal ‘help, God’ or jumal tarvis ‘God needed’’.
As an adverb of emphasis, jumala – the genitive form of the word jumal –
is used (EMS II, 6: 178). It usually expresses the meaning ‘completely, fairly,
quite’: Khk see oo nii jumala õige mis ma räägi ‘it is so God’s true what I’m saying’, i.e., ‘it is completely true what I’m saying’, Se tu oll´ jumala õnn, et ma är
pässe ‘it was God’s luck that I escaped’, i.e., ‘it was quite lucky that I escaped’.
In the case of negation, it intensifies the meaning ‘not at all’: Kse ma ei tea sest
jumala põrmu ‘I do not know God’s ashes of this’, i.e., ‘I do not know anything
at all of this’. As an adverbial of time accompanied by the words iga ‘every’ or
kõige ‘most’, the word jumala ‘God’s’ expresses the lengh of a period of time: Har
nuidõgõ käve kõgõ jumalõ talvõ ‘with these I walked the whole God’s winter’,
i.e., ‘I wore these the whole winter’.
Some other case forms of the word jumal ‘god’, its derivations and phrases
containing it that have merged into compounds and shortened have also acquired independent meanings (EMS II, 6: 178, 182). For example, the comitative form jumalaga ‘with God’ means ‘good-bye’: Pöi jäta vanaisa jumalaga
koa ‘leave grandfather with God, too’ i.e., ‘say good-bye to grandfather, too’;
deminutive derivation jumaluke(ne) or its partitive form jumalukest is used as
an interjection: Kod küll one kua irmus surm, jumalukene ‘it is indeed a horrible death, dear God’, Khk jumalukest, mis sa sest ka saad, seda oo ju nii vähe
‘dear God, what will you get from this, there’s so little of it’; the interjection
jumalime (~ jumala ime ‘God’s miracle’) ~ jumalmine ~ jumaline ~ jumalimel
(< *jumala nimel ‘in God’s name’) developed via coarticulative abbreviation:
Rei tere jumalimel ‘hello, God’s miracle (surprised)’.
No clear difference can be observed between dialects in the use of the word
jumal ‘god’ in different fixed expressions and its lexicalization in new figurative
meanings. However, exceptionally numerous and varied examples originate in
the Southern and Insular dialects as well as South Estonian linguistic enclaves
in Latvia.
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
WHAT DOES GOD DO (AND WHAT DOES HE NOT DO)?
In this section, we set out to answer the question what does jumal ‘god’ do on
the Estonian Internet? In other words, we search for verbal collocates of jumal
‘god’. The following analysis is based on the data extracted from the etTenTen
corpus, the currently largest corpus of Estonian, compiled of 270,000,000 words
of texts collected from Estonian web sites1. As we are interested in god’s activities, we searched for clauses that include the singular nominative form of the
word jumal ‘god’ as a noun and a proper noun and a verb in the 3rd person
singular form. Because of reasons of time and space, the query was restricted
to verbs in the indicative mood, present tense, and affirmative polarity. The
verb olema ‘be’ was excluded by search parameters.
Table 1. Top 20 verbal collocates of jumal ‘god’ Table 2. Top 20 verbal collocates of jumal ‘god’
based on absolute frequency
based on the log-likelihood measure.
of co-occurrence.
#
Verb
lemma
Meaning
Absolute
frequency
#
Verb
lemma
1
teadma
2
andma
3
know
612
1
armastama love
1,216
give
534
2
teadma
know
1,171
tahtma
want
460
3
tahtma
want
845
4
tegema
do
290
4
saama
get
683
5
saama
get
276
5
andma
give
654
6
armastama love
249
6
juhatama
guide
502
7
ütlema
say
224
7
kutsuma
call
472
8
võima
can
214
8
tegema
do
376
9
kutsuma
call
181
9
ilmutama
reveal
354
10
aitama
help
147
10
pidama
have to
350
11
nägema
see
144
11
tulema
come
348
12
rääkima
speak
143
12
õnnistama
bless
340
13
tulema
come
137
13
võima
can
329
14
ootama
wait
111
14
juhtima
direct
249
15
lubama
allow
109
15
päästma
save
230
16
juhtima
direct
106
16
võtma
take
206
17
pidama
have to
106
17
karistama
punish
203
18
võtma
take
104
18
hoolitsema
care (for)
200
19
juhatama
guide
97
19
kõnetama
bespeak
186
20
soovima
wish
97
20
vastama
answer
156
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Meaning Log-likelihood score
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Anni Jürine, Karl Pajusalu, Renate Pajusalu, Ilona Tragel, Ann Veismann
The search resulted in 8277 examples, some of which included two or more
clauses that contained jumal ‘god’ (as the subject) and a finite verb. After cleaning the data, we ended up with the final dataset of 8329 examples. Within these
8329 examples jumal ‘god’ co-occurred with 598 verb lemmas. In the following,
we present the top verb collocates of jumal ‘god’ based on absolute frequency
of co-occurrence (Table 1) and top collocates based on collocational strength
(calculated with the log-likelihood measure) (Table 2).
The tables suggest that the two methods of determining collocates give partly
overlapping results. The verbs that rendered the strongest collocates based on
absolute frequency as well as collocational strength are given in shaded cells.
It can be observed that on the Estonian Internet, jumal ‘god’ most commonly
armastab ‘loves’, tahab ‘wants’, teeb ‘does’, teab ‘knows’, annab ‘gives’, võib
‘can’, kutsub ‘calls’, tuleb ‘comes’, juhib ‘directs’, juhatab ‘guides’, peab ‘has to’
and võtab ‘takes’.
The data suggests that the verbs that are frequent collocates of jumal ‘god’
based on the absolute frequency of co-occurrence (see Table 1), but have weaker
collocational strength, tend to be more frequent in general and express neutral
activities (ütlema ‘say’, aitama ‘help’, nägema ‘see’, rääkima ‘speak’, ootama
‘wait’, lubama ‘allow’, soovima ‘wish’). However, some of those verbs, i.e. nägema
‘see’ (as in example (1)) and aitama ‘help’ (as in example (2)), are associated
with specific features of God, i.e. the omnipresence and omnipotence.
(1) Jumal näeb kõike.
‘God sees everything.’
(2) “Ma teadsin, et Jumal aitab meid sealt välja,” kirjeldas oma
läbielamisi kolmas päästetud kaevur 40-aastane Mario Sepulveda.
‘“I knew that God would help us get out,” said 40-year old miner Mario
Sepuvelda when describing what he had been through.’
On the other hand, not all of the strong collocates are necessarily among the
most frequent collocates of jumal ‘god’. Table 2 also includes verbs that are not
that frequent based on their absolute co-occurrence with jumal ‘god’. These verbs
have strong associational strength with jumal ‘god’ due to their low frequency
in general. Such verbs include lemmas that are rather specific to the agent at
hand, e.g. ilmutama ‘reveal’ (see example (3)), õnnistama ‘bless’ (see example
(4)), päästma ‘save’, karistama ‘punish’, hoolitsema ‘care (for)’.
(3) Jumal ilmutab end nõrkades, allasurututes, silmapaistmatutes.
‘God reveals himself in the weak, oppressed, mediocre.’
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
(4) Jumal õnnistab meid iga päev rikkalikult.
‘Every day God blesses us abundantly.’
When the common activities of jumal ‘god’ are compared to that of humans we
see little overlap. The list of common activities of humans is based on Veismann et al. (2002) who used the list task and cognitive salience index (Sutrop
2001b) to determine the most salient Estonian verbs. The comparison of the top
20 rankings in the two studies shows that only three verbs overlap – tegema
‘do’, tulema ‘come’, and armastama ‘love’ (Veismann et al. 2002: 320). The small
amount of shared verb lemmas may be due to the fact that the results have
been obtained using different methods applied to achieve different goals. The
list task in Veismann et al. (2002) was employed to determine the verbs that
belong to the core vocabulary of Estonian, whereas the present corpus study
attempts to investigate activities of a specific (inhumane) agent. Therefore, it
is not unexpected that the (human) subjects produced verbs that refer to more
mundane activities, such as eating, sleeping, drinking (Veismann et al. 2002:
321) but jumal ‘god’ is mainly associated with more abstract activities (e.g.
guiding, knowing, wanting). In the following sections, the main activities of
jumal ‘god’ are discussed in more detail.
God loves us ... no matter what?
Armastama ‘love’ is the most likely verb to co-occur with jumal ‘god’ according to the log-likelihood measure (see Table 2 above). Based on its absolute
frequency of co-occurrence, it holds the 6th position with 249 instances (see
Table 1). Most of the examples of armastama ‘love’ in our dataset pertain to
the Christian context, referring to the all-loving God (as exemplified in (5)).
However, there are also examples where conditions are listed, under which god
would love someone or something (see example (6)).
(5) Pidada meeles, et kõiki inimesi, sh kristlasi, armastab Jumal
tingimusteta ning sõltumata seksuaalsest orientatsioonist ja
sooidentiteedist.
‘One must keep in mind that God loves all people, including Christians,
unconditionally and regardless of their sexual orientation and gender
identity.’
(6) Sõnakuulelikku armastab jumal, sõnakuulmatut ta vihkab.
‘God loves the obedient, but hates the disobedient.’
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God knows and guides
Teadma ‘know’ is the most frequent verb (612 occurrences) and one of the
strongest collocates of jumal ‘god’. The data includes cases where teadma ‘know’
is used in its literal meaning (as in (7)) where the combination of the verb and
jumal is used to express the ability of God to know what somebody is doing.
However, in addition, the string jumal teab ‘god knows’ is also used as a lexicalized whole and it expresses indefiniteness. For instance, in (8) jumal teab
‘god knows’ means that nobody knows what the social workers are up to. The
semantic shift of the expression assumedly takes place in contexts observable
in (9). The shift is based on the assumption that god (only) knows [something]
and that we, i.e. humans do not. Therefore, nobody knows.2 However, this type
of change is not confined to jumal ‘god’ but can be found in case of other ‘taboo
agents’ (e.g. kurat ‘devil’) as well (see Kehayov 2009).
(7) Tõesti, Jumal teab täpselt, mida te teete.
‘Really, god knows exactly what do you do.’
(8) Sotsiaaltöötajad tegelevad jumal teab millega.
‘Social workers are up to god knows what.’
(9) Palju selle lammutatud süsteemi taasloomine jälle maksma läheb,
Jumal teab, Pille Saar mitte.
‘How much does it cost to rebuild the demolished system? God knows,
Pille Saar doesn’t.’
A similar semantic shift has taken place with the verb juhatama ‘guide’. Most
commonly, it appears in the examples such as (10) where the string (nagu) jumal
juhatab ‘as god guides’ has developed a holistic meaning ‘randomly’. Thus, in
this case too, the semantic shift is based on the interpretation that the manner
in which god guides things is unbeknownst to us, humans. However, in some
rare cases, the verb juhatama ‘guide’ also appears in its concrete meaning (as
in (11)). Such cases resemble examples with another verb stemming from the
same root – juhtima ‘direct’ (as in (12)).
(10) Tõsi, ühe kaupluse juures küll vahetati pudelid raha vastu, kuid seda
nii nagu jumal juhatab ehk täiesti ettearvamatutel aegadel.
‘True, at one of the stores, we managed to exchange the empty bottles
for money; but this happens at totally random times.’
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
(11) Katolikus ühiskonnas puudub üksikisiku vastutus, sest Jumal
juhatab nagu peab.
‘In catholic society, an individual has no responsibility because God guides
[people] in their actions.’
(12) Inimene mõtleb, jumal juhib.
‘Man thinks, God directs.’
God often gives, but less often takes
Andma ‘give’ is the second most frequent verb in our dataset. The combination of jumal ‘god’ and annab (give-3SG) has 534 occurrences in our data, and
the verb holds the 5th position as for the collocational strength. The entities
given by god include various types, e.g. God gives people peace (as in (13)) or
an overview (as in (14)). Majority of the instances of the phrase jumal annab
‘god gives’ are related to religious contexts (as in (13)).
(13) Jumal annab rahu südamesse ja hinge.
‘God gives [us] piece of mind.’
(14) Jumal annab siin ülevaate universumi elanike genealoogilisest
päritolust.
‘Here god gives an overview of the genealogical heritage of the habitants
of the universe.’
The opposite action, taking, is however more infrequent in god’s actions: the
instances of the phrase jumal võtab ‘god takes’ are about 5 times less frequent,
altogether 104 instances. Despite of this, võtma ‘take’ is still considered to belong
to the group of top collocates of jumal ‘god’. However, it should be noted that
the verb is mostly not used in the literal meaning but occurs as a part of the
phrasal verb võtab vastu ‘welcomes, accepts’, as in (15) or võtma ‘take’ + Vinf1
construction võtab kuulda ‘take heed’, as in (16) (cf. also Tragel et al. 2015).
(15) Jumal võtab KÕIK vastu, lollid kaasaarvatud!
‘God accepst everybody, even fools.’
(16) Et isegi kui üks inimene palvetab, võtab Jumal seda kuulda.
‘Even if one individual prays, God will hear them.’
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God wants
Tahtma ‘want’ is the third most frequent verb in our dataset (460 occurrences)
and holds the 3rd position in the ranking based on collocational strength. In
Estonian, the verb tahtma ‘want’ has many meanings and is grammaticalized
as far as to the postmodal avertive function (see Habicht et al. 2010). Wanting
in general is an intrasubjective concept expressing a desire and/or volition. According to our data, the desires of god resemble that of humans (see examples
(17) and (18)).
(17) Jumal tahab teha selliseid asju, mis haaravad inimeste tähelepanu.
‘God wants to do the kind of things that attract people’s attention.’
(18) … Jumal tahab, et minust saaks president.
‘God wants me to become a president.’
God comes, but does not go
The Estonian core verbs (see Tragel 2001) are rather well presented among the
top collocates of jumal ’god’. For instance, the top collocates include the following
core verbs – tegema ‘do’, tulema ‘come’, saama ‘get’, andma ‘give’, võtma ‘take’,
pidama ‘have to’, võima ‘can’. It is quite expected that the verbs that are very
general, grammatical, and frequent in Estonian are also present in the context
of god’s activities. After all, god made man after his own image, or rather, the
other way around. In each case, it is not surprising that their core activities
overlap. Nevertheless, some core verbs, especially verbs of movement do not
express activities common to jumal ‘god’. The data suggest that the combinations
of jumal ‘god’ and läheb (go-3SG) and jumal ‘god’ and käib (go-3SG) only appear
17 and 11 times respectively (see example (19)). Thus, it seems that jumal ‘god’
is fonder of actions than motion. However, tulema ‘come’, which occurs on 137
occasions and also belongs to the strongest collocates is an exception. Tulema
‘come’ typically appears in the examples where jumal ‘god’ moves (in a physical
or abstract sense) towards humans (see (20) and (21)).
(19) Tean nimelt, et Jumal käib mu ees ja kõrval.
‘In fact, I know that God walks in front of me and beside me.’
(20) Jumal tuleb maa peale!
‘God comes to Earth.’
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
(21) Jumal ise tuleb Jeesuses Kristuses meie juurde ning seda mitte vaid
kord, möödanikus, vaid pidevalt.
‘God himself comes to us in the body of Christ; and not only once in the
past, but constantly.’
In sum, the data suggests that in addition to the more common, neutral verbs,
the collocates of jumal ‘god’ also include verbs that are more agent (god) specific
(e.g. päästma ‘save’, ilmutama ‘reveal’, õnnistama ‘bless’, armastama ‘love’,
and karistama ‘punish’). These verbs reflect the dominantly Christian nature
of jumal ‘god’ on the Estonian Internet. The data also suggests that jumal ‘god’
is more fond of action than motion and that the top verb collocates are quite
abstract as for the actions they refer to. As god walks in mysterious ways, the
combinations of jumal ‘god’ and certain verbs (teadma ‘know’, juhatama ‘guide’)
have acquired holistic interpretations, meaning ‘indefinite’ or ‘random’.
JUMAL IS NOT ALWAYS ‘GOD’
Although in modern language use when using the word jumal ‘god’ the speaker
is not always referring to god as a higher power Estonians’ language use is
nevertheless based on a Christian background (see also Riistan 2006). However, as in other European languages the use of God’s name differs from that
of earlier times when even naming the higher power could have great consequences. One of the speech acts associated with god is swearing. People “swear
by some higher force or somebody; we swear that something is so; we swear to
do something; we swear at something or somebody; and we swear simply out
of anger, disappointment, or frustration” (Hughes 2006). Swearing, originally
having ritual meaning, has developed into emotional exclamatory sentences
and intensifiers of scalar qualities.
Jumal ‘god’ as an interjection
The noun jumal ‘god’ can occur as an emotional interjection comprising an
independent utterance (mainly in the form oi jumal! ‘oh God!’; issand jumal!
‘Lord God!’, jumal küll! ‘God indeed!’ or jumaluke! ‘dear God!’) or belonging to
a larger utterance as a syntactically free adjunct. In this case the noun jumal
‘god’ is desemanticized, the utterance lacks internal structure (c.f. Taevake!
‘Heavens!’, Oh sa tuline tuhat! lit. ‘Oh you fiery thousand!’, Kurat! ‘Devil!’,
Sa armas aeg küll! lit. ‘You dear time!’ etc, see EKG II 1993: 182). Similar
constructions in dialects were discussed above.
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The exclamative utterances containing jumal ‘god’ mostly express some type
of emotion and are placed within the syntactic unit that specifies the object of
that emotion. These exclamatory sentences originate from an appeal to some
higher power who should then help the speaker with his/her predicament related to the emotion. Sometimes the construction also explicitly contains a term
of address sa ‘you’ (oh sa jumal! ‘oh you God!’, oh sa püha jumal! ‘oh you holy
God!’ etc.). Historically, such address has been deontic (the speaker tried to
influence the higher power to do something), in the modern secularized world it
is rather the expression of the speaker’s subjective emotion (Arnovick 2000: 4).
While it is probably impossible to list all the emotions that the phrases
containing jumal ‘god’ represent, a few types can be observed in the data. For
example, one distinct group is comprised by situations of opposition where the
speaker utters a sentence beginning with an exclamatory phrase containing
jumal ‘god’ that opposes the partner’s previous statement (22–24). The phrase
containing jumal ‘god’ can also precede a reproach (25).
(22) R: mul akkab juba alb kui ma seda suurt söömist $ vaatan $.
‘I get sick already when I look at all this eating.’
E: o:i jumal (.) mul läheb aina paremaks. (1.0) [S]
‘Oh God, I feel better and better.’
(23) jumal küll ega ma sis nüüd ei ole (-) mingi siuke hehe $ röövlitädi [S]
‘For God’s sake, I’m not some such robber-auntie.’
(24) ah jumalukene ega ma tervet lugu soa meelde jätta sis. [S]
‘Ah dear God, I can’t remember the whole story, can I.’
(25) Issand jumal! Sa ikka alles minemata!
‘God! You still haven’t gone!’
An exclamatory phrase containing jumal ‘god’ can also occur at the end of the
sentence. In example (26) it seems to express mainly irritation and occurs after
the partner has initiated self-repair and coveys displeasure that the repair was
needed at all.
(26) M: $ ma enam ei tee. $ (laughter in the background)
‘I won’t do it again.’
T: $ autor krooksub. $ hehe
‘The author belches.’
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
M: $ mis autor ma olen. $
‘I’m no kind of author.’
T: nojah, [see kes LITEREERIB, jumal küll.] [S]
‘Alright, the one who transcribes, for God’s sake.’
Since exclamatory phrases containing jumal ‘god’ are widespread and stylistically fairly neutral in everyday speech they are often used for marking the
occasions when somebody else’s words or thoughts are being reported. In example (27) the speaker repeats Riho’s words which, according to the speaker,
Riho had said in a surprised manner. Characteristically to spoken language
the reported speech starts with the conjunction et ‘that’ but since the intonation changes and the pronoun teil ‘you’ probably refers to Riho’s conversation
partner the illusion of direct speech is created for the listener. issand jumal
lit. ‘Lord God’ helps to support this interpretation.
(27) T: .jajah? (.) siis lähed öösel [uut otsima.]
‘Yes, then you go at night to look for a new one.’
L: [ei saa peksa.] (.) Riho imestas=et (1.0) @
issand jumal teil need veel alles. @ hehe $ ei ole ikka katki läind. $ (1.2)
[S]
‘Won’t get beaten up. Riho wondered that God you still have these, they
still haven’t broken.’
Sometimes, thoughts that may never have been uttered can be presented as
reported speech. The speaker conveys the event as if it took place at the time
of speech and the phrase containing jumal ‘god’ adds emotional authenticity.
In example (28) the parts oh jumal ‘oh God’ and mis nüüd saab siis ‘what will
happen now then’, starting with the conjunction et ‘that’, specify the content of
the phobia that is mentioned earlier, oh jumal ‘oh God’ indicates that the phobia
is emotionally loaded. Example (29) does not contain a conjunction and the
strongest device creating the appearance of direct speech is the phrase issand
jumal ‘lit. Lord God’. In examples (27), (28) and (29) it can be seen that the
phrase containing jumal ‘god’ combines with deictics (teil ‘you’ and need ‘these’,
nüüd ‘now’, see ‘it’ and mina ‘me’, accordingly) and the verbs in the sentences
are also in present tense (although the rest of the context, characteristically to
a narrative, is in past tense) which also supports the impression of direct speech.
(28) nojaa aga aga asi on selles, et kui nüd eksole sattuda niuksesse ee
foobiasse, eksole=et oh jumal et mis nüüd saab sis
‘Yes, but the thing is that if you get into such a fobia, right, that, oh God,
what will happen now then’
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(29) A: [jajaa] (.) aa, mina vaatasin enne ülikooli ees=et, kellele (.)
kellele=se=Jaak nii viipab onju, nii sõbralikult=et ma olin (.) ma olin ka
nii kaugel, [s=lähedal] vaatsin issand jumal mis [see on,
‘Yes, yes, but I was looking earlier in front of the university that who
does that Jaak wave to, right, in such a friendly way that, I was, I was
also so far, near, I looked that, God, what is it,’
M: [(-)] [issand kas see tõesti olen mina (-)]
‘Lord, is it really me’
Such phrases containing jumal ‘god’ that intensify the emotion being described
also occur in written text that attempts to convey the emotionality of spoken
language. Example (30) refers to the speaker’s feelings which are in fact only
characterized by the phrase issand jumal lit. ‘Lord God’.
(30) Kui ma fentanüüli proovisin, siis ma tundsin, et issand jumal, kas
on tõesti võimalik, et kõik halvad emotsioonid on kadunud.
‘When I tried fentanyl I felt that, God, is it really possible that all the
bad emotions have dissappeared.’
Jumal ‘god’ as an intensifier
The genitive form of the word jumal ‘god’ has grammaticalized into an intensifying adverb meaning ‘very’ and modifying an adjective (see also EKSS 2009).
It was mentioned above that this use is also present in dialects. Jumala ‘god’s’
can probably intensify any adjective but it is primarily found with scalar3 adjectives (31–34).
(31) Siis nägin Markot ja ajasime juttu ja jumala kihvti juttu võib see
tüüp ikka ajada. [I]
‘Then I met Marko and we talked and that guy can really talk.’ Lit. ‘can
talk God’s amazing talk’
(32) tal on jumala sirged siuksed panni juuksed on muidu onju [S]
‘He/she has totally straight hair like a pan otherwise, right.’ Lit. ‘God’s
straight hair’
(33) ja=ja siis Summing seal noh minuga jumala suur < sõber > onju [S]
‘And-and then Summing there, well, really great friend with me, right.’
Lit. ‘God’s great friend’
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
(34) Anni juurde seal on jumala ilus onju [S]
‘To Ann’s place it is really beautiful there right.’ Lit. ‘God’s beautiful’
Jumala ‘god’s’ can also intensify scalar adverbs (35).
(35) Aga pooled neist või vähemalt paljud neist olid kuidagi tiidakil
ja Klaara maja “paraad” -uks oli märgatavalt tiidakil, kaks paekivist
trepiastet servast murenenud ja ülemine jumala lõhki, …
‘But half of them or at least many of them were somehow askew and the
front door of Klaara’s house was noticeably askew, two limestone steps
crumbled at the edges and the upper one completely split, ...’ Lit. ‘God’s
split’
Jumala ‘god’s’ can occasionally also occur as a modifier preceding a noun, thus
functioning as an adjective meaning approximately ‘true, real, great’. However,
this use is considerably less frequent than its use as an adverb. Pajusalu (2006)
only found one noun – õnn ‘luck’ – with jumala ‘god’s’ as its modifier (36) in
the spoken language data whereas kuradi, the genitive form of the word kurat
‘devil’ which has similar functions at first glance typically occurred as a modifier (kuradi paarike ‘damn couple’, lit. ‘devil’s couple’, etc.)
(36) aga jumala õnn=et ´Kadaka ´Tiia see (.) mees mehel tulid brigaad
tuli ´krohvima ga´raazhi minu kõrval=ja [S]
‘But it’s God’s luck that Kadaka Tiia’s that husband had a team come to
plaster the garage next to me and’
Jumala ‘god’s’ as a modifier is more frequent in written language but mostly
preceding abstract nouns that can be interpreted as scalar and that could also
be preceded by adjectives suur ‘big’ or täielik ‘total’. For example, there are occurrences of the noun phrase jumala tõsi ‘God’s truth’ (37).
(37) Hoolimata spontaansest teietusest oli see jumala tõsi ning ei johtunud
kindlasti mitte joodud pudelist õllest, see oli isegi minu jaoks tühine kogus.
‘Despite the spontaneous use of teie [polite form of address] it was God’s
truth and was definitely not caused by the bottle of beer I had drunk,
that was a paltry amount even for me.’
There are also some sentences in the corpus where jumala ‘god’s’ modifies a verb
(38) although these are probably not acceptable as grammatical for all speakers
of Estonian. Here as well the meaning is primarily intensifying.
(38) Vaatasin enda kätt ja siis üks hetk jumala kangestusin.
‘I looked at my hand and then one moment I totally froze.’ Lit. ‘God’s froze’
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Phrases containing jumala ‘god’s’ can also function as intensifiers. All the exclamatory phrases described above intensify the emotions being expressed.
Sometimes such exclamatory phrases can also be used as modifiers following
a noun (sihuke naistemees et jumal hoia ‘such a ladies’ man that God keep’, 39).
(39) Vahest on säherdune vennike, kui koduse lõa otsast pääseb, sihuke
naistemees et jumal hoia! [I]
‘Sometimes such a guy, when he escapes from the leash at home, is such
a ladies’ man that God keep!’
As in dialects, in written language there is also such use where the meaning
of jumala ‘god’s’ is rather ‘natural, all-encompassing’. Accompanied by time
units jumala ‘god’s’ occurs in the construction iga jumala päev/nädal/? ‘every
God’s day/week/?’ (40, 41) where the function of jumala ‘god’s’ is to intensify
the meaning of the quantor iga ‘every’.
(40) Ma ju tunnen seda nagu oma kodu, iga jumala päeva veedan ma
seal, olgu külm või sadagu vihma.
‘I know it like my own home, every God’s day I spend there, be it cold
or raining.’
(41) Iga jumala nädal viis ta mind, isa tähendab, ratsutama.
‘Every God’s week he took me, father, that is, riding.’
Idiomatic phrases jumala eest and jumala pärast
As already mentioned above the word jumal ‘god’ occurs in many fixed phrases,
two very frequent of which are jumala eest and jumala pärast that could both
be translated as ‘for God’s sake’.
It is a relatively rare phenomenon that words that are considered to be semantic antonyms can occur as synonyms in certain contexts. However, some
examples can be found among highly polysemous words (e.g. great and fine).
Estonian temporal adpositions eest ‘ago, since’ and pärast ‘after’ can be considered a semantically opposite pair (for example in sentences 42 and 43).
(42) Kahe aasta eest ‘two years ago’
(43) Kahe aasta pärast ‘after two years’
Both eest and pärast have grammaticalized through the concept of space.
Both have become adpositions in the elative form of a noun (ee-st ‘front-ela’;
pära-st ‘back-ela’). The etymological origin of the adposition eest is the noun *eδe
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
(> esi, gen. ee) which means ‘location in front, e.g. the strip or section of work
ahead’. The word has cognates in several Finno-Ugric languages (for example
Finnish, Veps, Ostyak, Vogul, Hungarian), also in the meaning of ‘front part’
or ‘the area in front of the mover’ (EES 2012). The etymological origin of the
adpostion pärast is the noun *perä (> pära, gen. pära) meaning ‘location in
back, rear part or end’ (also with cognates in several Finno-Ugric languages,
e.g. Livonian, Finnish, Komi etc.) (EES 2012).
The adposition eest has the (separative) meaning of spacial location (example
44, 45), the adposition pärast only expresses temporal and abstract relations.
(44) Kohe maja eest läheb suur tee mööda.
‘A big road passes right in front of the house.’
(45) Keegi ei tule mu maja eest lund ära koristama.
‘Nobody will come to clean up the snow from the front of my house.’
Both adpositions have numerous meanings/uses in the abstract domain, some
of them being either similar (eest ‘reward’ and pärast ‘cause, reason, because
of’) or (less frequently) the same (võitlema millegi eest~pärast ‘fight for sth’).
In addition, both adpositions eest and pärast can be accompanied by the noun
jumal ‘god’ as a complement, thus forming synonymous fixed phrases jumala eest
and jumala pärast, lit. ‘for God’s sake’, an exclamation to emphasize a request.
We will now go on to examine the use of these two phrases in written Estonian.
The data was gathered from the Balanced Corpus of Written Estonian and the
Estonian internet corpus etTenTen via keeleveeb.ee.
The query jumala eest yielded 95 sentences from the Balanced Corpus and
1060 sentences from etTenTen. Of these, 449 were analyzed (after randomizing
the sequence of the sentences). The query jumala pärast yielded 38 and 390
sentences, accordingly, from the two corpora, leaving 351 sentences for analysis
after the unsuitable sentences were removed. The sentences considered unsuitable were those where jumala eest or jumala pärast was either used in its literal
sense (religious texts) or were exclamatory sentences containing only the one
phrase. The religious sentences left out of the analysis were nevertheless briefly
examined in order to get information about how the meaning of the phrase had
developed. While the Spelling Dictionary of Estonian (ÕS 2013) also suggests
that it is possible to spell jumalapärast as a single word, this was not included
in the analysis since it would have only yielded six additional sentences, out of
which only three would have been suitable for analysis. Grammatical polarity
(negative, affirmative) and mood (indicative, conditional, imperative) of the
verb in the clause associated with the phrase jumala eest or jumala pärast
were analysed in the sentences.
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As the data show, the phrase jumala eest is considerably more frequent in
written Estonian than jumala pärast. Both jumala eest and jumala pärast are
used to express various desires, commands and prohibitions.
The phrase jumala eest was most frequently used in combination with the
negative of conditional mood (example 46), 117 times. Negative of imperative
mood was used 96 times (example 47) and affirmative of indicative mood 100
times (example 48). Jumala eest was least frequent in combination with the
affirmative of conditional mood (19 times, example 49).
(46) Nägin, kuidas maja kõikus, ja mõtlesin: et ta jumala eest siiapoole
ei kukuks.
‘I saw the building sway and thought: that it wouldn’t fall this way for
God’s sake.’
(47) Arva vähem ja jumala eest, ära rohkem kirjuta.
‘Have fewer opinions and for God’s sake, don’t write anything else.’
(48) Jumala eest õige jutt ja mitu kuud tagasi oleks juba tehtud pidanud
olema.
‘By God, that is true and it should have been done several months ago.’
(49) Kui ma tohiksin nutta, jumala eest, ma nutaksin.
‘If I were allowed to cry, by God, I would cry.’
The phrase jumala pärast is most frequently accompanied by negation in
imperative mood (example 50), 108 times, and negation in conditional mood
(example 51), 87 times. Jumala pärast was least frequently accompanied by
affirmative in conditional mood, 6 times.
(50) Jumala pärast ära looda, et nad sind aitavad...
‘Don’t, under any circumstances, hope that they will help you...’
(51) Kõik valvavad kõiki, et keegi jumala pärast rohkem ei maksaks
kui siin on heaks tavaks.
‘Everybody is watching everybody, so that no-one, under any circumstances, would pay more than is best practice here.’
Both phrases occur more frequently in negative sentences but jumala pärast
favors negation more often (jumala eest 62% in the context of negation, jumala
pärast 73% in the context of negation). Jumala pärast is frequent in the context
of clearly verbalized prohibitions (ärge jumala pärast tehke ‘do not, under any
circumstances, do sth’), the use of jumala eest is characterized by prohibitions
in conditional mood (et nad jumala eest ei teeks ‘hope to God, that they wouldn’t
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
do sth’). It is notable that jumala eest occurs relatively frequently also in the
affirmative of indicative mood, where it occurs in the meaning of ‘indeed’
(example 48), whereas jumala pärast is rather rare in such context.
To sum up (see Figure 1), jumala eest occurs both in requests that something not be done (in conditional or imperative) and as a disjunct in the sense
of ‘indeed’.
Jumala pärast mainly occurs in imperative or conditional mood with requests
that something would not be done/not happen. Jumala eest is more frequent
and has semantically wider use than jumala pärast.
Looking at the sentences that were not included in the analysis and where
the phrase occurred in a relgious context it can be observed that jumala
eest is collocationally most frequently associated with conceiling and hiding
(example 52) and escaping (example 53).
(52) Aga sa ei saa Jumala eest midagi peita, mis mõte on siis isegi
püüda seda teha?
‘But you cannot hide anything from God, then what is the point of even
trying to do that?’
(53) Ma põgenesin palju aastaid Jumala eest.
‘For many years I was escaping from God.’
Figure 1. Jumala eest and jumala pärast in Estonian Balanced Corpus
and etTenTen.
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Jumala pärast mainly occurs in a context where something is being done because
of God, God is the motive for doing something (for giving something up, fighting,
loving etc.). It could be said that in the religious context the adpositions in the
adpositional phrases jumala eest and jumala pärast have retained a certain
connection with the original, spatial meaning: when escaping or hiding, the
escaper moves in front of the one from whom he/she is trying to escape; while
pära ‘rear end’ is the part of a vehicle that, when one applies force to it, can be
used to make the vehicle move and give it speed. Prohibition, which is especially
characteristic to the idiomized expression jumala pärast, is also compatible with
the corresponding meaning ‘because of God’ in a religious context. Jumala eest,
on the other hand, has moved farther from the original meanings, which is also
attested by the more frequent use in more varied contexts4.
CONCLUSIONS
In this article we examined the meanings of the Estonian word jumal ‘god’.
First, we presented an overview of the origin of the word jumal ‘god’ and its
use in the dialects of Estonian. We then examined the verbs associated with
the word jumal ‘god’ based on the data from the corpora of written Estonian.
The comparison of frequency data and collocational strength revealed the verbs
most frequently used in combination with the word jumal ‘god’. These verbs
can be neutral, having a very general meaning (tegema ‘do, make’, pidama
‘have to’, võtma ‘take’) or specific to God as an agent (e.g., armastama ‘love’,
õnnistama ‘bless’). In combination with some verbs the phrase has acquired
holistic interpretations, meaning ‘indefinite’ or ‘random’ (e.g., jumal teab ‘god
knows’). Jumal ‘God’ as an interjection is frequently desematicized, exclamatory utterances containing the word jumal ‘god’ express some emotion. These
emotional units can be used in different conversational contexts, e.g. for marking
direct speech. However, the connection between these phrases and applying to
a higher power for assistance is transparent to some extent. The genitive form
of the word jumal ‘god’ has grammaticalized into an intensifying adverb in the
meaning of ‘very’ and primarily modifies scalar adjectives (e.g., jumala ilus ‘very
beautiful’, lit. ‘God’s beautiful’). In the final part of the article we examined two
synonymous idiomatic adpositional phrases containing the word jumal ‘god’ –
jumala eest and jumala pärast ‘for God’s sake’. The corpus study showed that
jumala eest is more frequent in Estonian and the meaning of the phrase may
have desemanticized into the meaning ‘indeed’ (occurring also in combination
with a verb in the affirmative of indicative mood). The phrase jumala pärast
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Estonian Jumal ‘God’
is less frequent and its usage is restricted mainly to the negative of imperative
and conditional moods. It can be observed that while these adpositional phrases
have retained a certain semantic connection to the meaning of the same phrases
in religious context, both have developed into phraseological units.
In conclusion, it can be said that while speakers are often not referring
to a higher power when using the word jumal ‘god’ in modern Estonian, the
language use of Estonians is nevertheless based on a Christian background
(see also Riistan 2006).
ABBREVIATIONS FOR PARISHES
Har Hargla
IisR Coastal Iisaku
JämJämaja
KaaKaarma
Khk Kihelkonna
Kod Kodavere
Krk Karksi
KseKaruse
Lai Laiuse
Lüg Lüganuse
Mar Martna
Mus Mustjala
Pöi Pöide
Rei Reigi
Rõu Rõuge
SeSetu
NOTES
1
http://www2.keeleveeb.ee/dict/corpus/ettenten/about.html.
2
As such, the expression is somewhat close to the phrase mine tea (go.IMPER +
know.IMPER), meaning ‘do not know’) (see Tragel 2003).
3
For scales see, for example, Sutrop 2004b.
4
Cf., for example, Geoffrey C. Williams who has shown how the collocations of the word
God vary in the New Testament, the works of Shakespeare and BNC depending on
whether the word God refers to an actor who is present (most frequent in NT), an
external force (most frequent in the works of Shakespeare), or whether the resonance
with the divide meaning has been lost (frequent in BNC) (Williams 2008).
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